In-Between: The Microtonal Universe

Started by snyprrr, October 26, 2009, 10:32:57 PM

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Cato

#140
From the September 22, 2016 Wall Street Journal:

Quote...Mr. Maalouf plays on a trumpet with four valves, a technique pioneered in the 1960s by his father, Nassim Maalouf. By adding that fourth valve, Mr. Maalouf can play the quartertones that hide between the 12 notes of the chromatic scale, which provides the backbone for most Western music.

Following an award-studded career as a classical trumpet player, Mr. Maalouf self-trained as a jazz musician, and his custom-made instrument allows him to reach the half-sharps and half-flats that are tricky for other trumpet players to articulate. It is those quartertones that are characteristic of Arabic music, a tradition from which the trumpet is mostly absent. Mr. Maalouf fuses Western and Eastern traditions, and in his compositions the 12 tones of standard jazz scales merge with the 55 of Arabic makamlar....



See:  http://www.wsj.com/articles/kalthoum-by-ibrahim-maalouf-review-the-power-of-one-valve-1474488862

Also:

https://www.youtube.com/v/UNaJjWTEEDs
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Karl Henning

Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Cato

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on September 22, 2016, 04:08:29 AM
Those shady quarter-tones!

;)  Not much shade in Egypt!  But I must wonder about that parka he is wearing in the music video!  ???
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Karl Henning

Quote from: Cato on September 22, 2016, 04:05:37 AM
https://www.youtube.com/v/UNaJjWTEEDs

Interesting call-&-response between an Asia-style arena-prog "head" and the generally soft-breathed solo.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Cato

Many things by Maalouf on YouTube: my impression is that the microtonal aspect is more ornamental than a substantive part of the harmony.  Skimming through, I found some fun and nicely done things!
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

zamyrabyrd

Quote from: Cato on September 22, 2016, 04:09:37 AM
;)  Not much shade in Egypt!  But I must wonder about that parka he is wearing in the music video! 

Taken from the youtube vid: "with shoots from "Dans les forets de Sibérie" movie".
Microtones of course as much easier on stringed instruments without frets.
(Must admit the music doesn't do a lot for me, would rather sans the repeating vamp...)
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one."

― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

Karl Henning

Quote from: zamyrabyrd on September 22, 2016, 06:50:37 AM
(Must admit the music doesn't do a lot for me, would rather sans the repeating vamp...)

Sounds a bit like a Genesis cover band . . . .
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

SeptimalTritone

Nowadays, it seems like most contemporary chamber music works have some degree of microtonality, usually not using an entire microtonal equal-tempered scale, but rather looking out for specific-sounding harmonies and sonorities, especially through contrast between one instrument or instrumental group and another.

From what I vaguely understand, this is standard practice in spectral music.

Ligeti's Ramifications for two quarter-tone apart string orchestras https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXbr1nyMFUc
Ligeti's Hamburg Concerto contrasting overtone natural harmonics of horns with traditional equal-tempered orchestra https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXWjayXSzcE and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqVV_CUQzT4
Grisey's Vortex Temporum with microtonally-tuned piano contrasting with standard instrumental tuning https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXaNFBzgDWI
Xenaki's Eonta with overtone brass contrasting the piano, as before https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIZuHBKgfoc and Anaktoria https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhTPo9bjOko and others.

Or... swarms of instrumental glissando are a microtonality too.

Xenakis's Metastasis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZazYFchLRI
Penderecki's Threnody https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HilGthRhwP8
and anything heavily based on glissando

Or vocal microtonality.

Luigi Nono's Prometheus Suite https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5n-JuMnzVgA

... I wish I had more examples of microtonal choral music.

Dax


Cato

Quote from: zamyrabyrd on September 22, 2016, 06:50:37 AM
Microtones of course as much easier on stringed instruments without frets.
(Must admit the music doesn't do a lot for me, would rather sans the repeating vamp...)

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on September 22, 2016, 08:31:30 AM
Sounds a bit like a Genesis cover band . . . .

Quote from: Cato on September 22, 2016, 06:35:51 AM
Many things by Maalouf on YouTube: my impression is that the microtonal aspect is more ornamental than a substantive part of the harmony.

Quote from: SeptimalTritone on September 22, 2016, 09:15:16 AM

... I wish I had more examples of microtonal choral music.

Try this!

https://www.youtube.com/v/GIb6CebsDYA&index=1&list=PLUSRfoOcUe4ahT5GOSZZLWPJI7vaDepIu
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

torut

Some of microtonal music recordings I enjoyed recently.

Rhys Chatham: Pythagorean Dream (Foom, 2016)
[asin]B01DCZ0734[/asin]
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-VjkFdSwLsijnAIOrqfTo6bA_AeosPim
Chatham plays the Pythagorean tuning guitar, flute and trumpet. Deep and rich.

Chris Brown: Six Primes (New World Records, 2016)
[asin]B01G5O67FQ[/asin]
http://www.newworldrecords.org/album.cgi?rm=view&album_id=94309
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh0Byzwjv-ZNj85I5-5NxPV0lZLHprmKx
Six Primes is composed using the first six prime numbers 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, and 13 to govern both its tuning and temporal structure, including harmony, rhythmic subdivisions, and form.

Dave Seidel: The Problem of Moments (2016)

https://mysterybear.bandcamp.com/album/hexany-permutations
Hexany Permutations was inspired by Tom Johnson's piece "The Chord Catalogue," where all of the possible chords that occur within one octave for a given scale are presented [...] The scale uses the following ratios: 1/1, 7/6, 5/4, 35/24, 5/3, 7/4, 2/1, and is tuned to 1/1 = 180 Hz.

Overtone Ensemble (Important Records, 2016)
[asin]B01DVLW0RU[/asin]
http://theovertoneensemble.com.au/
The Overtone Ensemble perform and record using microtonally tuned metal rod instruments designed and built by Tim Catlin.

Schweinitz/Lamb: Plainsound Counterpoint / Mirrors
[asin]B00UKNFJF8[/asin]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pweb_QtiglA
Schweinitz: Seven 23-limit Harmony Intonation Studies for double bass solo
Schweinitz's music is exceptional. No sentimentality, no accessible melody, yet beautiful and enchanting.

David First / The World Casio Quartet - The Complete Gramavision Session (1989)
[asin]B01HII2VMQ[/asin]
http://www.pogus.com/21084.html
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFBomSeDkjEr4QHK1DVAnDM2ZMi0Nui4x
A quartet of detuned Casio CZ1000 synthesizers formed by David First.

milk

Quote from: torut on January 18, 2017, 11:17:46 PM
Some of microtonal music recordings I enjoyed recently.


Thanks for this!

snyprrr

Quote from: Cato on September 22, 2016, 12:28:21 PM
Try this!

https://www.youtube.com/v/GIb6CebsDYA&index=1&list=PLUSRfoOcUe4ahT5GOSZZLWPJI7vaDepIu

OK, I'm having a Microtonal Breakdown here... that Choral Music sounded like the wailing of the damned to me... what would Jesus think of this?? I'd be like, "Don't muddy up my adoration with all that weepy muck... I want exaltation and glory, not droopy weepy... come on, where's the love?"


I'm sorry, afterr the three Ives pieces, I feel like I'm done with whatever it is people are calling the microtones these days... I mean, EVERYTHING I hear- the more microtonal it's claimed to be, the more ennui I HEAR coming out of the speakers, as if the only "mood" microtonal composition can engender is a gray overcast depressing rainy day... oy vey, help me out here!!


And, at this point in History, I just consider ornamental bending as microtones,... like the "blues" bending... yea, I know it sounds that way, but, the harmony is still I-IV-V, so, just bending is just "expression" and not structural.

aANY STRUCTURAL MICROTONAL PIECE I'VE HEARD JUST ENDS UP SOUNDING LIKE THE DREARY STUFF I'VE ALREADY HEARD- Wyschnegradsky, Ezra Sims, the Ives pieces, Lou Harrison... Well Tempered Piano... guitatr....

spectral... microtonal... fancy pants...


NO CLOTHES... THE KING HAS NO CLOTHES!!!!!!!!


45 tones per octave--- BULLSHIT!!!!!!!!.... you might as well call it witchcraft...  sorry, now I'm just ranting and hating :-[


It's just that everyone seems to take this sooooo seriously, and the results are always horrendous.... HORRENDOUS!!!~!


iT'S THAT eZRA sIMS DISC THAT DID IT TO ME... sorry, CapsMania... Ezra Sims, that CRI disc... can't stand it...

It's like the notes are TOO close together, like houses that are built too close... no body wants to be that cramped...


MICROTONES GIVE ME THE CRAMPS!!

There, I said it- don't cramp my style with microtonal harmony....gaaaaah



RANT: off

snyprrr

Off the top of my head- The Best Example of Microtones in the History of History:

the guitar solo for 'My Guitar Gently Weeps'


the rest is noize

torut

Quote from: milk on January 19, 2017, 01:41:56 AM
Thanks for this!

And your latest work is very nice. I've been enjoying the recent clips but I'm glad to hear a new piece using alternate tunings.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooCRXM00VrQ

torut

Quote from: SeptimalTritone on September 22, 2016, 09:15:16 AM... I wish I had more examples of microtonal choral music.

Also, how about this?
Michael Harrison: Just Constellations - Roomful of Teeth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvYiHLHoe2g&list=WL&index=171%5B/url


Quote from: snyprrr on January 19, 2017, 07:22:58 AM
It's like the notes are TOO close together, like houses that are built too close... no body wants to be that cramped...


MICROTONES GIVE ME THE CRAMPS!!

There, I said it- don't cramp my style with microtonal harmony....gaaaaah

But 64/63 comma sounds better than a 12ET semitone!

milk

Quote from: torut on January 19, 2017, 09:08:42 PM
And your latest work is very nice. I've been enjoying the recent clips but I'm glad to hear a new piece using alternate tunings.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooCRXM00VrQ
You're very kind! Thanks!

snyprrr


Rinaldo

*swoons*

Fabio Costa
Aphoristic Madrigal for SATB Soli & Fokker Organ in 31-Tone Equal Temperament

https://www.youtube.com/v/Lq9-6NnXPVg

Cato



Quote
Quote

"...The Infinitone, an elongated pyramid of brass, resembles a futuristic soprano saxophone, with the usual mouthpiece, reed, and ligature. But while a sax's keys attach to valves that open and shut, the Infinitone has five motorized slides that give it the flexibility of a trombone or guitar. The horn plugs into an iPad, which controls the slides. Rather than playing the instrument directly, the player touches the screen to play a colorful spectrum of 512 notes — 256 per octave, instead of the usual black-and-white 12.

In Atlanta, Singh and his Infinitone would go on to win first place and $5,000. The judges included Mike Adams, the CEO of Moog Music — a company that had created another paradigm-shifting instrument — and Alfred Darlington, also known as electronic musician Daedelus, who raved about the possibilities that Singh's invention opened up.

"It looks like a soprano sax," Darlington said in a recent interview. "But what it's able to do defies the held beliefs of what an instrument should express."

Today, Singh is poised to release Infinitone DMT, a software based on the eponymous instrument, which will allow anyone to access notes they've only dreamed of. "Just like painters can paint using a palette of almost infinite shades," says Singh, "musicians can also make music with infinite varieties of musical intervals."...




As I recall, researchers have found that most people can distinguish differences down to 1/12 of a tone.  Beyond that, it will not matter...for most people.   8)

See:

https://expmag.com/2021/03/it-looks-like-a-saxophone-but-plays-512-notes-many-youve-never-heard-before/?utm_source=pocket-newtab][url]https://expmag.com/2021/03/it-looks-like-a-saxophone-but-plays-512-notes-many-youve-never-heard-before/?utm_source=pocket-newtab[/url]


And:


Quote

Many traditional musical cultures do not use 12ET as a basis for musical creation. The traditional music of India and the Middle East, for example, are based on highly-evolved microtonal expressions. These traditions, however, generally feature only a single melodic line, played in a single fundamental key (modulation to various tonal centers is uncommon).

Infinitone DMT endeavors to bring about a paradigm shift in music, combining the rich nuance of tonal possibility from older music traditions with the modulation, harmonic, and contrapuntal possibilities exemplified in Western music.

Precision pitch adjustment now becomes an integral and dynamic part of the creative process for musicians, allowing them to create brand new scales with notes they've never used before.

The limits are simply left the musician's own imagination.



See:


https://infinitone.com/
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)